What a brilliant day we’ve had! Year 1 headed off to Monkey World for the day today and a great time was had by all! We chose to visit Monkey World to tie in with our writing lessons which are going to be based on information texts. Over the next few weeks the children will be writing lots of facts and becoming monkey ‘experts’, so we thought this was a good place to start!

We began our visit with a talk from one the the Monkey World team (Annie), who told us about the work Monkey World does to rescue primates and rehabilitate them. Annie was very impressed with the children’s responses to her questions and their existing knowledge about matters such as climate change and deforestation.

We then headed off to explore the site. The first stop was with the Woolly monkeys who were out and about enjoying the sunshine.

We then headed down to see Gordon the orangutan. He wasn’t feeling very sociable this morning, but one of the other orangutans came up close to say hello!

By now, we were all feeling pretty peckish, so we found a shady spot for a picnic lunch, followed by a play on the climbing equipment (lots of the children appeared to turn into monkeys at this point!).

After lunch we were lucky to arrive at a different orangutan enclosure just as they were being fed. We spend quite a while having them play and swing past right in front of us! They seemed to enjoy looking at us as much as we liked looking at them! It was a real treat to see them so close!

There was time for a last little play before heading for home.

I feel I should mention how proud I was of all the children and how well they behaved throughout the day. It was a long, sunny day that required a lot of listening on their part. They were a pleasure to take and were great ambassadors for Southill School. Well done Year 1! Now it’s time to become monkey experts!